Pay telephones currently exist with a conventional two-line vacuum florescent display for displaying information about telephone calls. When a pay telephone is not in use, the conventional two-line display is often used to display or scroll text which may be used for advertising to attract a user to the telephone. The use of text-only information produces a rather uninteresting advertising format and furthermore, such information is pre-stored in the telephone at the time of manufacture or during a service call.
With the advent of the use of graphic displays in pay telephones, and with the use of the ADSI communications capabilities, advertising can be made more interesting.
In addition, telephone service providers such as the Talking Yellow Pages (tm) currently provide information in an audio format to the users making requests of such services. Use of such services, however, is valuable to only those who are satisfied in receiving data in an audio format. However, some of such information may be presented rather quickly and can be difficult to write down, for example, exchange rate information or directory assistance information. It would, therefore, be desirable to allow a user to observe such information on a graphical screen. Users of public telephones frequently need a means of recording information provided by a Directory Assistance (DA) service, and there is a growing requirement for the user to make and retain a record of each call placed, for accounting and other purposes.
At best, a user is equipped with a pen or pencil and paper to make appropriate notes. Other users will be forced to depend upon memory, which can result in the dialling of incorrectly remembered numbers and consequently, necessary expenses. Worse, some users may record the information by means of a knife or other sharp object, thus causing damage to the telephone booth or worse.
There are situations where even a user equipped with pencil and paper will have difficulties, for example where several possible numbers match the criteria provided to the DA service.
This invention reduces the impact of these problems and shortcomings by providing the user with a printed, hardcopy record containing the number provided by the DA service, the details of a call transaction, or of other information that may be appropriately submitted to or gathered by the telephone network, and subsequently delivered via the same means.